Being a fraud

Being a fraud in on mind this morning. I had to slam together a proposal yesterday, no research, no prep.. “just get me some numbers”.. so I did and I am confident that they are representative anyway. But, anytime I expose myself this way I wonder if I will get found out. I know this is a human issue, we all have this. There was a great Ted talk about shame that talks about it and is revelatory. Still every job interview, every time I send out a resume or proposal there is this nagging, “who do you think you are?”. My friend Tim suggests that this is more a gender thing than I think I want to admit. I am reading “Million Dollar Women” and she talks a lot about how women in particular need to get it perfect, know all the facts and have all the credentials before moving forward and men just go for it. The male montra is more “Yah, sure I can do that.” Where women are likely to quantify or be honest when, really, a white lie of “Sure I can make an Excel Spread sheet” in an interview is easily remedied over the weekend with Lynda.com. My theory is, if this is true, that this is why you don’t have a lot of women politicians or Presidential candidates. If there is are jobs out there where you spend most of your time flying by the seat of your pants it would be those!

I was apart of Al-Anon and Aliteen for years growing up. I had a great sponsor at one point who always used to say, “Honor you feelings and then use them for fuel.” Not as hippy as other quotes on this subject than I have read like, “have your feelings and then let them go”. Those might be more appropriate for states of being like mourning, but all those daily feelings of self doubt, self mutilation and reprimand, he said they are apart of you so use them, don’t be used by them. It’s something I like to remember before going into a meeting or interview. Taking those thoughts and using them as puzzles or challenges instead of fate or fact.

The mental conversation goes something like this:

Voice “Your way out of your depth here, you don’t know what your doing.”

Me “Lesser people have done very well, thank you, and if there is something I don’t know I can hire someone or figure it out. I am not walking into brain surgery as a surgeon or running into a burning building.”

This is terrible, BUT, when I was pregnant with A, I was terrified of becoming a parent. My role models are iffy at best, and I spent years, raising myself through therapy etc and I really did not want to inflict this on this innocent unmolded soul growing inside me. I boarded an A train heading south and there nodded off in the corner seat was an obvious heroine junky, very pregnant. After alerting the train conductor who got her help at the next station, I thought well see.. He won’t have it THAT bad.

On that front I still assert that as long as when he is in therapy, he is talking about different stuff than I was, then I did a good job. Generational evolution is important.

I think this it for me for now.

Time to walk the dog.

Bye for now and thank you.

PS – I highly recommend Al-Anon and/or Aliteen for those who have had any serious relationship with someone who is an addict of any kind. It is free, totally anonymous and there are meetings all over, all of the time.